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Not allowin root login with remote services like ssh also adds to the sercurity because you have to know two passwords instead of one to get to a root shell.
Don't know if this is like this in other *nixs too, but in openbsd, if the weel group is populated, only members of wheel can su to root. So if you make sure all members of wheel have strong passwords and so does root, brute forcing youre way to root would be considerably longer...

Pretty much, there's nothing you won't be able to do as root, whether you intend to or not... that includes deleting needed files caught in a typo or filling your disk up so full that your system will not be able to reboot (you can fill the disk up as a normal user, too - but it's smart enough to leave a reserve).

There are lots of reasons to not do this... pretty much the easiest one - it pretty much defeats all security on the box.

That's pretty much it. You can also use other utilites to control your work as root, like sudo. I like sudo, because you have much more control over commands executed by multiple admins, it will ask for a password for each command (helping you to make sure that you want to do something) and you NEVER have to give out the root password. Giving out the root password to multiple people is just bad policy all around.

Originally posted here by DjM You can 'su' to any account on a *uix system, providing you know the account password. If you are root, then you can 'su' to any account without a password. (at least it use to be like that, I haven't played with *uix for awhile now).

yes i know...... and to simplify that, you can su to any account provided that you know the root password (or the password of someone in an equivelant group)

also, incase you think of it giving your 'personal' account access in the root group dosnt do anything differently than just logging in as root so you kinda get screwed the same way if your account has full privelages...... if that makes any sence to anyone but me

pretty much says everything about why you shouldnt run as root all the time.

BTW, I been there and done that. thankfuly it was just my personal machine

Also, even if you are very very careful about what commands you use and apps you run, if you have to leave a machine for an emergency bathroom or cofee run and dont logout, someone else could cause many problems for you if you are logged in as root